Title: The Corner of My Eye
Author: Rudolph Kohn
Publisher: Self-Published
Publication Date: February 14, 2023
Genres: Paranormal, Contemporary
Length: 7 pages
Source: I received a free copy from the author.
Rating: 4 Stars
Blurb:
Moving into a new house can be stressful, and it can be refreshing. But what do you do when you start to hear strange sounds and see hints of motion out of the corner of your eye? What happens to your mind when all of your efforts to get to the bottom of these strange phenomena comes up with nothing? A short Lovecraftian story about figments of your imagination, or perhaps reality.
Review:
Always ask questions if something seems too good to be true.
One of my favorite things about this tale was that almost nothing was revealed about the protagonist. The first paragraph mentioned that they had just bought a new home, but this was really the only piece of information shared about them. Everything else, including their sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, race, ethnicity, and a million other descriptive adjectives that could be used to paint a mental image of who they were as a person, was left blank. This meant that basically any reader out there could imagine themselves in this character’s shoes as they closed on their new home and gradually began to realize they weren’t the only occupant there.
I did find myself wishing that the last scene could provide a deeper explanation of what was already inhabiting the narrator’s new home, especially given the other knowledge this individual had acquired by that point. While I wouldn’t have expected to know everything by the final sentence, having even a few more sentences explaining what was going on would have encouraged me to choose a full five-star rating for this short story.
This started off as a fairly typical paranormal story but soon shifted into something a bit more frightening than is usual for this genre. I loved seeing the protagonist react to each new development as they attempted to figure out how to best handle a situation that was rapidly spiraling out of control. As much as I wanted that final scene to provide a little more guidance, it did end on a deliciously scary note and was well worth the read.
The Corner of My Eye made me shiver.